Nicely done, my friend.

Your argument mught even work if people didn’t recall that Bush’s tax cuts were not introduced as a result of the downturn. His intial argument was that since we had a surplus, we oguht to return money to the pople. Plus, supply side, supply side, supply side.

Supply side economics is pretty simple. If we are on the right side of the Laffer curve, tax cuts will generate economic growth, resulting in higher taxes collected from lower rates since their is more economic activity to tax.

Arguing that a recession invalidates measurement of the Laffer curve is just silly. If we were on the right side of the curve, tax cuts we bring us out of the recession.

The Maximum Leader makes my point with his citing of the Kennedy years. Kennedy raised taxes. The economy grew. According to supply side economics, the economy WOULD HAVE tanked if we pushed farther to the right. That didn’t happen.

This was also shown by the Clinton tax raises. Clinton raised taxes and still presided over a massive economic expansion.

Arguing that things are more complex is also arguing about the validity of supply side economics as a whole. The economy is complex. Part of the Clinton boom was the result of Reagan’s loosening of government oversight of business - a policy maintained by the very centrist Clinton. Supply side economics makes a very clear prediction. Tax raises to the right of the curve will always result in a retardation of the economy. This simply hasn’t happened.

So either supply side economics is just plain wrong as a theory.

Or, we are on the left side of the curve. In which case tax raises, not cuts, are called for.

The Laffer curve is simple (See here for a two paragraph explanation and the graph itself). I’m not being a hayseed here. But don’t let the Maximum Leader fool you with his fluff.

(Smallholder dons a blindfold, takes a drag on his cigarette, and prepares himself for the fate of all dissidents in the Mike World Order.)